Sipping a soda in the food court of a West Des Moines mall recently, Iowan Cari McIntosh said she hasn’t kept tabs on the flurry of Cabinet nominations and other critical hires that President-elect Donald Trump is making as Inauguration Day approaches.
McIntosh, a supporter of the former and soon-to-be president, said she doesn’t have to.
“I don’t pay attention because I think he knows what he’s doing, I really do,” said McIntosh, 54.
Following his victory last month, Trump has made a flurry of appointments to fill out his Cabinet and the rest of his incoming government. Some are controversial with confirmation in the Senate not yet guaranteed. Others are unconventional.
But Trump voters from 11 states — including those with senators likely to play a key role during upcoming confirmation hearings — told the USA TODAY Network none of that matters. They trust Trump.
Some voters said they are watching the parade of nominees like a hawk, while others like McIntosh have largely tuned out the news. But most gave positive reviews of Trump’s best-known hires like Health and Human Services nominee Robert F. Kennedy Jr., FBI director pick Kash Patel and world’s richest man Elon Musk, saying they’re confident the president-elect knows what he’s doing.
“I’m supportive of outsiders that don’t have long Washington credentials,” said Chris Hicks, a 59-year-old consultant in Cincinnati, Ohio. “The mandate to Trump from Trump voters, more than anything, is that we need to reform government.”
Scott County, Tennessee voted overwhelmingly for President-elect Donald Trump on Election Day. Many in the county are supportive of Trump’s picks for his cabinet. On Dec. 7, the county held a large Christmas parade.
‘He’s got fighters’
Trump’s first term in the White House was marked by personnel drama and infighting that at times was so contentious the former president fired staff via Twitter.
It’s a dynamic that was on Trump’s mind in the final days of his 2024 campaign for the White House. In one of his last public appearances before Election Day, Trump re-litigated the Cabinet battles of his first term and promised to staff his next administration with better people.
Maurice White Jr., 71, a registered nurse in Shreveport, Louisiana, said he agreed Trump made a mistake in his first term by staffing his administration with people recommended by D.C. insiders. He’s been watching Trump’s administration choices closely, like a “hawk hungry on a limb in a desert.”
“This time he’s got fighters; he’s got people that have been screwed over by the same entrenched bureaucracy,” White said. “I’ve never seen an administration choose people like this. And choose such radical people, but radical in a good way, people who would stand up and fight for what they believe in. I don’t think they’re going to steamroll Donald Trump.”
Maurice White, Jr. photographed on December 6, 2024, in Shreveport, Louisiana.
Trump supporter Glenn Gromann, an attorney and real estate developer in Boca Raton, Florida, who has met Trump personally and visited his nearby Mar-a-Lago club, said he’s thrilled by the incoming administration.
“I think he wants to hit the ground running,” Gromann said. “He has the experience now. People learn from trial and error. That’s what he did in 2016, so he’s not going to make the same mistakes again.”
Attorney Glenn Gromann, a Boca Raton developer and consultant, (right), sits with his date, Jean M. DaRocha, a member of the Trumpettes, at the group’s gala Feb. 11, 2024 at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach.
Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., tapped to be the new administration’s secretary of state, ranks as Gromann’s favorite pick for Trump’s Cabinet. He’s also been impressed by his encounters at Mar-a-Lago with “border czar” Tom Homan and Dr. Mehmet Oz, the doctor and TV star nominated to run the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
“They are good people,” Gromann said.
Bradley Youngman, a 45-year old sheriff in Daviess County, Kentucky, also praised Homan. Youngman attended this year’s Republican National Convention as a delegate for Kentucky for the first time.
“He did a good job last time, and I think he’ll do a good job again,” Youngman said.
Senate confirmation could hamper Hegseth
Though his supporters are on board, several of Trump’s nominees are facing challenges getting enough support in a narrowly-divided Senate where Republicans early next month will have a 53-47 majority. Presidential nominees need a simple majority vote in the chamber to serve in the Cabinet.
Republican lawmakers can approve Trump’s choices without any votes from Democrats – so long as almost all members of the GOP are on board.
That is posing an uphill climb for Pete Hegseth, Trump’s controversial pick for Defense secretary who has been accused of sexual assault and drinking in the workplace. He has denied the allegations. Sen. Susan Collins, a moderate Republican from Maine, is among the lawmakers undecided on whether to confirm Hegseth.
Elizabeth Jordan, a fellow Maine Republican from Kennebunk who ran unsuccessfully for the state legislature this fall, told the USA TODAY Network she supports Hegseth’s nomination and all of Trump’s picks.
Elizabeth Jordan
“I am thrilled with his choices,” Jordan said.
Hegseth also received praise from Lori Viars, the vice president of anti-abortion group Warren County Right to Life, who lives in Lebanon, Ohio.
“I think he would be great. Has he done everything perfectly in his life? No, he hasn’t,” Viars said. “Some of what they’re saying may be true, and probably a lot of it is false.”
Viars called Trump’s choices “common sense picks,” particularly Rubio and his fellow Floridian Pam Bondi, the former state attorney general who Trump picked to serve as U.S. attorney general after his first choice dropped out amid allegations of sex trafficking minors.
Musk and Ramaswamy garner praise, skepticism
Some of the most polarizing Trump administration hires – Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy – won’t require Senate confirmation. Trump tapped the pair to head a new Department of Government Efficiency aimed at curtailing government spending.
Shelia Arnett, a hospice-specific health care recruiter from Ocala, Florida, hailed Musk and Ramaswamy’s initiative as “needed.” So did Grace Anne Blake, a salon owner in Shreveport, Louisiana.
“As a business owner, we’re constantly dealing with waste,” Blake said. “So having two people that like getting rid of waste is huge.”
Others were more skeptical about Musk’s newfound closeness with Trump – and Ramaswamy’s outspoken personality.
“I might have left Elon Musk off,” said 79-year-old Hazel Kyar of Glendale, Arizona. “It makes me think they’re trying to do something with his money because he’s rich.”
Jamey Bobo, a 45-year-old truck driver who lives in Greer, South Carolina, and has been to nine Trump events, said he views Ramaswamy as untrustworthy.
“Vivek, I can do without him. He’s a race baiter and he can’t be trusted. He talks too much about race and one thing we’re trying to do is get away from that,” Bobo said. “The only mistake Trump can make is messing around with Vivek.”
Lukewarm Trump voters optimistic about cabinet
It’s not only die-hard Trump supporters who are optimistic about the president-elect’s selections.
Emmett Reistroffer was “probably the loudest Nikki Haley supporter in South Dakota” during the Republican presidential primary, but the 34-year-old cannabis industry professional has come around on Trump and his Cabinet picks.
Kennedy is an “incredibly important and exciting pick,” said Reistroffer, who lives in Rapid City. Both Kennedy and Tulsi Gabbard, nominated to be the director of national intelligence, are “not beholden to party loyalty or special interests” in Reistroffer’s view.
Emmett Reistroffer
He did say the controversies around nominees like Patel for the FBI or Hegseth at defense — or Matt Gaetz, who’s no longer in the running to serve as attorney general — did feel reminiscent of Trump’s transition after winning the 2016 election.
And despite Reistroffer’s own criticisms of Gov. Kristi Noem, he said South Dakotans should be proud to see their governor chosen to lead the Department of Homeland Security.
Fellow South Dakotan Paul Soroka, who immigrated to the United States from Ukraine in 1999 and owns a tailor shop in Sioux Falls, also appreciated Noem’s nomination to lead DHS.
Soroka said he thinks Trump’s first term as president gave him good experience and will make him more selective about the people he keeps around him and turns to for advice.
“I can’t say I’m 100 percent a pro-Trumper and everything he says, I say ‘Amen.’ No. But we have to choose the best out of everything,” Soroka said.
Voters happy to see Gaetz withdraw
Meanwhile, several of Trump’s nominees have already withdrawn from consideration for his Cabinet, including Gaetz. The Florida Republican — now a former member of Congress — was up for the U.S. attorney general role but faced scrutiny for being embroiled in an alleged sex trafficking scandal.
Keyna Humphrey is 53 and lives in Red Springs, North Carolina, where she works for local government. She’s voted for Trump in the last three presidential elections, despite being a Democrat in previous years.
Humphrey has been paying close attention to the picks along with her husband, and she’s “over the moon” excited about all of them. She said the choices show Trump has surrounded himself with “brilliant” people that will reflect his policies for years to come.
Humphrey was particularly fired up about Trump’s inclusion of several women in his Cabinet lineup, including “super smart” women like Bondi, Gabbard and Linda McMahon, chosen to lead the Department of Education.
She was surprised by Trump’s initial pick of Gaetz, saying he gave her some “pause.” Humphrey was much more excited about Bondi, who replaced Gaetz after he withdrew from consideration.
“I don’t think he was the right guy, but he’s gone,” said Gromann, the Boca Raton attorney who mingles at Mar-a-Lago.
In Tennessee, rural Scott County voted for Trump by the highest percentage of all of the state’s 95 counties. Scott, a rural county on the border with Kentucky, was the longtime home of the late-Sen. Howard Baker, Jr., the former Senate GOP leader and White House chief of staff under President Ronald Reagan.
Lorenzo Garcia, sits inside his restaurant El Rey Azteca in Oneida, Tenn., Saturday, Dec. 7, 2024.
Lorenzo Garcia, 48, who opened El Rey Azteca in the county 20 years ago as part of his family’s Mexican restaurant chain, said he supports Trump’s tougher immigration policy and is optimistic about the future.
“He gives people hope,” Garcia said.
Dianne Massey left Scott County before returning in the 1980s. Massey and her family are big Trump supporters. She thinks he can continue what he started eight years ago.
But hopefully with less bravado and social media outbursts, she said.
“I think he’ll pull through,” she said, “if he keeps his mouth shut and people leave him alone.”
Contributing: USA TODAY Network reporters Terry Benjamin II, Makenzie Boucher, Margie Cullen, Sarah Gleason, Erin Glynn, Trevor J. Mitchell, Hannah Pinski and Kelly Puente.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Trump Cabinet: Supporters across 11 states back his nominations
